WAYN overhauls interface to wow travellers

WAYN has gone live in its core markets with a fresh new design interface and a complete transformation of the platform to enable its users to better discover where to go, what to do and who to meet.

The new site helps users on a journey of “destination discovery”, provoking inspiration on where to travel to next as well as what to do when you get there and who to connect with to make the most of your experience.

Peter Ward, chief executive and co-founder of WAYN said: “We are extremely proud of the new platform, which whilst only 10% of the vision, is designed to encourage users to share their experiences, meet people and discover the best places to go to as well as what to do once they get there.

“We have re-built parts of the site from the ground up, consulting our users at every stage.

“A selection of current and new users have had the opportunity to test the site in advance, to ensure that we get the first version of the new vision, absolutely right.

“Now, engaging with locals, experienced travellers who’ve been and budding jet-setters who want to go to any destination, has never been easier.”

The platform includes a Pinterest-style wall, in the context of every destination around the world, showcasing not only pictures added by users of that destination, but also who lives there, who has been and who wants to go, as well as tips and questions added by users, places to visit and more.

Members of the platform can search or browse any destination and filter it by their WAYN, Facebook and Foursquare networks with a click of a button, so that they can quickly find recommendations on where to go and what to do, based on what others have already experienced.

Users can also filter the results by people or content type, making it easy to find what they are looking for, by destination.

Content that they like can be pinned to their profile and eventually, they will be able to create customised collections of their favourite things and share them with others.

WAYN currently has over 50 global tourist boards, airlines, hotels and travel operators as partners and has become one of the world’s leading platforms for driving user engagement and influencing travel decisions.

The re-launch of the platform has drawn interest in the industry from reputable brands, the launch partners include the likes of Gauteng Tourism, Indonesia Tourism, Roomwise, and Topdeck Travel to name but a few.

With headquarters in London and a team in Poland, WAYN now has a global network of offices in Cape Town; New York and most recently in Delhi, via its partnership with India Today Group (ITG).

WAYN currently boasts over 21 million members, 15 million visits per month while 70,000 trips and activities are added each day, establishing the site as the world’s largest travel and lifestyle social media platform.

Ward added: “We believe that we are on the road to developing the next generation social travel platform.

“The re-launch is the first step; we have numerous exciting features still to be released over the coming months.

“Our focus in the past has been on connecting people, whereas our focus is now on building a recommendation engine for where to go and what to do, as well as who to meet.”